


Hold On, Let It Go

by livrelibre



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Captain America: The Winter Soldier Spoilers, Moresomes, Multi, My First Smushname, OT3, OT4, Polyamory, Spoilers, Srs BSNS, Threesome
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-14
Updated: 2014-04-14
Packaged: 2018-01-19 10:40:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,200
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1466359
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/livrelibre/pseuds/livrelibre
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sketches of variations on Bucky/Sam/Steve/Natasha</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hold On, Let It Go

**Author's Note:**

> So this was a writing exercise to start working out my OT4 feels after CA:TWS because I wanted a Cap 2 poly story with Bucky/Sam/Steve/Natasha. This is not that story and it's not the fluffy OT4 with hugs and pancakes that I need and I made Sam (and everybody frankly) sadder than I like but it’s a start at sketching out how this might come to pass that hints at a bunch of ship permutations. Also I tried to make each section a set length--200, 250, 300, 250, 200 words each--and tried to work in a theme (see title). Title is actually a mashup of Wilson Phillips and Frozen soundtrack song titles, just because it amuses me. Unbeated. I regret nothing.

Dreams of falling are common, Sam knows, a sign of anxiety about life spinning out of control, and given recent events and their respective tendencies to challenge gravity, he and Steve would be more than justified in jerking awake nightly. But watching the loves of your lives, your hearts, plummet into the void, and then having to relive that again would give even the strongest men nightmares. Sam gets Steve’s Bucky trauma all too well. What he didn’t expect was how Steve’s fall would make him feel, Riley spinning from the sky all over again and Sam too late, too far to catch him. On what Sam has privately dubbed their Where’s Winter Soldier? road trip (scanning crowd scenes for a metal arm instead of a striped shirt), they turn to each other for comfort in beds that don’t feel substantial enough to hold up them and their falling ghosts. Steve might be unintentionally sleeping with him only as substitute or security blanket on long nights, but that’s alright. Sam will hold on to him with all his strength for as long as he is needed. He’s not going to let another brother, comrade-in-arms, and lover slip through his fingers.

*

When she deliberately blows everything apart, and the last threads of who she is and has been start to unravel, Natasha goes to ground. The Red Room, the Winter Soldier, S.H.I.E.L.D. (well, HYDRA)--nothing lasts and none of her covers will hold anymore. After being anything required for so long, who is she, who will she be now? The freefall takes her to Clint (to debrief and berate him for being off-grid during the most significant op in S.H.I.E.L.D.’s history), to a few completely off-record boltholes and contacts (to gain intel and literally tie up some loose HYDRA ends), and finally back to Steve and Sam. She still has red in her ledger; the Winter Soldier is the biggest of her entries now; and there are a handful of people she trusts to help her find him, chiefly them. She shows up at their hotel with a few bottles of vodka and the whole story. She’s not particularly surprised at Steve’s embrace on learning of her mindwipes and fractured history with Bucky or at the comforting hand Sam lays on their shoulders. A few more bottles and confessions, fewer clothes, some friendly and athletic sex, and a morning later, she’s only slightly bemused to find herself tangled up and embraced between their solid, warm bodies. With very little in the world to hold onto, sometimes it’s nice to be held by those she can trust to have her back.

*

All the king’s horses and all the king’s men. Natasha and Steve are neither anymore, most of S.H.I.E.L.D. as scattered as his self, but they are certainly trying their best to recover all the pieces and put him back together again. When they finally catch him, or he finally gets weary of dodging their dogged pursuit if he’s being honest, he thinks Steve’s face and Natasha’s determination will break him before deprogramming will. They both offer him shared memories, Steve’s golden-tinged and clothed in grief, love and guilt, Natasha’s brutal, red and black, and commiserating. They slide their reminiscences in like scalpels, cutting away the dead tissue, exposing his insides to air and light, and making his own memories well up like all the blood he has shed They insist that it will wash him clean and they don’t mind the stains; they carry their own. They stitch him up and kiss the scars like cherished wounds, Steve at the first sign he won’t draw back a stump (before even, loving fool that he is) and Natasha as soon as he’s cleared, going the expedient route of riding him in a much more enjoyable version of their last encounter. He wakes one night from a nightmare of falling and blood to find them both there, careful not to touch until he surfaces and recognizes them, there for him and not fading away. He says their names, equal parts hope and longing, and they surround him and he surrenders finally. He still can’t see how they can stand to be with him after all that he’s done, but it’s Sam who points out that he’s got the wrong children’s story. He’s not Humpty Dumpty; he’s the Skin Horse, battered and stitched and loved into being real.

*

Sam’s always been a big believer in "if you love someone, set them free.” Steve’s said that he loves Sam, that he plans to hold on to him no matter what, but Sam figures that’s just Steve, true blue all around, too haunted by loss to let anyone important to him go voluntarily, and too loyal for his own damn good. He’s got his Bucky (and Natasha) now and three’s kind of a crowd. He’ll still be there for Steve anytime he needs him, especially if it gets rough, but he’ll just hang back and eventually go his own way. If he feels his heart drop at the mere thought, well, he’s survived worse and he’ll have the consolation of good memories, good friends, and knowing good people are finally getting the hand they deserve. What he doesn’t count on is the observational, seduction, and stalking skills of two spies and that they’re as stubborn and loathe to let go as his super soldier and might want him as much. He finds himself making out with Natasha for cover on a suspicious amount of missions and he suspects bridal carrying a sniper to his positions shouldn’t involve so many uncomfortable erections. When vodka shots at a dance club turns into him sandwiched between the two of them showing off their best moves in front of a glazed-eyed Steve, he lets that self-sacrificing bullshit go. He can hold on to Steve and two ex-Soviet assassins; he's clearly an adrenaline junkie anyway.

*

Steve still wakes up from nightmares of falling sometimes; they all do. It’s been a long hard road to let go of some of their burdens (or at least share them with each other) and find some peace. When he does wake, nerves jangling, he knows just where he is and who is with him. He can see the tender curve of Sam’s back though his face is buried under Steve’s chin, feel the weight of flesh and body-warmed metal holding him close, hear Natasha’s quiet breaths on the other side of Bucky. Lying in the close darkness, he remembers the sweet push of Sam lighting him up from the inside and the hot tightness of Bucky’s ass around him earlier in the evening, and can still hear the little noise Natasha made each time their thrusts pushed Bucky into her. They’d all collapsed into a tangled pile afterward, hands stroking through hair and breath slowing gradually. Here and now, he is surrounded by the people he loves and he doesn’t know how he got so lucky. He has everything he needs right here in this bed and he plans to hold on to it and never let it go.


End file.
